Gallery of Photographs

Maxine Rude's Displaced Persons

"Displaced Persons were merely survivors stateless And homeless; their families had been slaughtered in extermination camps, lost in concentration camps, or, if lucky, were survivors and were now in other displaced All their possessions had been confiscated In wild juxtaposition, they were still in a the lowest level of persons camps or destroyed Germany that had humanity.

At the end the war they were rounded up and temporarily put into camps where teams of rescue and social workers gathered and recorded as much family background aspossible. Then began the difficult search for loved ones who might be alive.Rehabilitation and repatriation and the still followed.

Inside the camps, there was domestic activity of all kinds. The peoples cultures often came out in what they made and what they did.

In Jewish camps, discussions were often cerebral philosophical. They focused on education, music, and arts. There was good organization with much planning for the future. Going to Palestine was foremost in their thoughts. The people lived each day preparing for the realization of going to their homeland, Palestine. How enlightening to hear their determination. They knew of the magnitude of the political obstacles. Yet their goal was solid. Nothing would deter them."

-Maxine Rude

Photo: Lft: Maxine Rude and Genya Markon, Curator of Photography, United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. March 11, 1997. Rude was brought to the Museum to help identify her photos from the post-war period. Courtesy of USHMM..

UNRRA Children's Center, Biberach, Germany (French Zone), 1946.

UNRRA Czechoslovakian nurse with orphans, 1945.

A Jewish Orphan, Cared for by a German Nun, UNRRA Children's Center, Kloster-Indersdorf, near Augsburg, Germany, 1946 .

UNRRA staff member bids farewell with flowers to Displaced Persons being repatriated to Poland; trains were decorated for the event. Lauf, Germany, 1946.

Front Entrance to Crematorium of Concentration Camp at Dachau, Near Munich, Germany, 1946

M.R.: Note chimney for smoke from furnace where bodies were burned.
Dachau, opened in April, 1933, was a camp for political prisoners and was never classified as an extermination camp. However, there is some debate about whether a gas chamber on the premises was ever used. Some American camp liberators insist it was, while others do not. Every camp disposed of dead bodies by cremation, which was the German law at that time.

Orphan in UNRRA Hospital Bed, Brno, Czechoslovakia, 1946

M.R.: The face of fear, loneliness, and isolation was seen on thousands of children whose parents were torn out of their lives disappearing into concentration camps or slave labor. As time has passed and clear knowledge has become available, it is even more horrifying to realize that this could happen.

M.R.: Within the gloomy confine of an old monastery, without parents or home, a young boy cares for an infant he had never known before. The pathway to their security was not yet real, only temporary. Where are they today? Fifty years have passed since I saw them...

Greta Fischerova with Orphan Children at Table, Kloster Indersdorf, near Augsburg, Germany, 1945

M.R.: These hungry children anxiously eat a meal. The Czechoslovakian nurse was with them daily. She gave them love; the children seemed happy and content. Nights were something else. When lights went out for sleeping, there was quiet at first. Then an eerie wail would come from one of the children. Soon others chimed in and the room became a chamber of horrific harmony. I was told that it was reminiscent of the Tales of Treblinka, a Nazi death camp.

M.R.: The usual fare served at this Children's Camp in West Germany was soup and whole grain bread. As more children arrived, food was sought from any source. These women are unsung heroines. Every touch and kindness afforded each bewildered child by these women was a tiny step towards life.

M.R.: This was to have been an unannounced visit but the ''grapevine'' in the camps overshadowed other intelligence efforts. Mrs. Roosevelt was warmly greeted by these people who had but one thought in mind - Palestine

M.R.: Eleanor Roosevelt, dressed in black in mourning for her husband, President Franklin Roosevelt, visits the Zeilsheim Camp. A tour of the entire camp was planned. I went ahead of the group to the library. Inside I found women scrubbing and cleaning. They were throwing torn and dogeared books and material out a window into rain and mud. When Mrs. Roosevelt entered, she saw immaculate but almost empty shelves and remarked, "Is this all they have to read?" I wanted to interrupt and take her to the window where she could see evidence of voracious readers. Admired and respected wherever she went, it was well known that she was Chair of the committee to draft a universal Declaration of Human Rights.

M.R.: Hedwig Rademacher (seated) speaks with LaGuardia about her imminent return to Bojanov, Poland, on a repatriation train. Able to speak several languages, LaGuardia could speak with displaced persons of many nationalities, including Rademacher, who had been forced labor during the War.

M.R.: Clothing specifically for the displaced persons poured in from many countries. Distribution became a major problem when it was discovered that much of the clothing was in unusable condition due to the length of time taken to process it for shipment. Rot, mold, button disintegration, and overall deterioration was prevalent.

UNRRA Supply Warehouse, Hanau, West Germany, 1945

M.R.: Shown in front of an UNRRA warehouse is a fleet of trucks sent by the U.S. National Catholic Welfare Committee to be used for distribution of supplies. The warehouse contains both food and clothing.

Toy Factory Started by Displaced Persons in the French Zone of Germany, 1946

M.R.: One of fifteen small businesses in Bindau. The French were the first to give displaced persons the right to work within the German economy eventually to make their own.

M.R.: It was always such a revelation seeing the art done by those in the camps. So much was dark and heavy, often reflecting the justice that had vanished from their lives. After completing this mural, this young man would make the trip to Zeilsheim, a transit camp. There he would join other Jewish displaced persons who were preparing to leave for Palestine

M.R.: Repatriation was a slow and difficult process. Much effort was expended by UNRRA personnel to give displaced persons a feeling of being cared for. UNRRA focused relentlessly on repatriating them to the land from whence they came - if it was possible. Here several families of Balkan background come together to grow a vegetable garden.

Children playing – Typical Displaced Persons Camp, West Germany, 1945

M.R.: It was a redeeming experience to see children who had never met, play so warmly together in these camps. Often one heard different languages spoken. Understanding foreign words however, was peripheral to the delight of their play.

UNRRA Transient Camp, Deutches Museum, Munich,Germany, 1945

M.R.: A Jewish mother and child stop for food and shelter at the Deutches Museum Camp. This scene was used for background in the film, The Search. It told the story of the upheavel of a Jewish family from Prague. Only the mother and her nine year old son survived Auschwitz and wandered through the UNRRA world in Germany in search of one another.

M.R.: This White Russian woman was among several hundred women released from a camp when the Nazis capitulated. American soldiers found them naked in a field. Despite that grotesque situation, much later she was allowed to enter Heidelberg University under the sponsorship of UNRRA.

Women in Polish Repatriation Train, 1945

M.R.: Polish women, forced into Germany as slave labor, prepare to leave for their homeland. Some were leaving reluctantly. Their needs were being met by UNRRA and relief agencies in Germany. Their future in Poland was unknown. The displaced persons' camps had given them a kind of solace by allowing them to remain in strange limbo for a time. The camps afforded a relief from the fatigue of the mind. However, these women were ultimately forced to go back to their homeland.

Dachau Death Camp Memorial, Near Munich, Germany, 1946

M.R.: Remants of crematorium chimney and memorial with an original furnace door embedded. Many German farmers living nearby claimed to have no knowledge of what had gone on there. It is inconceivable that they were unaware of what was taking place in the extermination camp as they had claimed during postwar interrogation.

Memorial Day parade at Polish Camp with men mocking torture tactics and wearing the Buchenwald Concentration Camp uniforms, U.S. zone, Germany, 1946.

Residents at UNRRA Displaced Persons' Camp in what was then West Germany engaging in neighbourly conversation while awaiting repatriation to their homeland, 1946.

Monument to murdered Poles at Dachau. The doors are the original ones taken from the furnace of the crematorium at the concentration camp, 1946

Monument at Dachau Concentration Camp. Iron doors were from crematorium ovens. German farmers worked farms nearby yet claimed no knowledge of what took place there, 1946.

UNRRA administrative officer greets some of the first ten Jewish students permitted entrance to Heidelberg University after the Nazi's capitulated at the end of WWII, 1946.

German child at Wiesbaden hospital—his parents, in anger, asked me why our American planes had done this to an innocent child…? We saw countless amputees of this sort, 1945.

Director General Herbert H. Lehman, first Director of the United Nations Relief & Rehabilitation Administration, Washington D.C. No date.

Director General of UNRRA Operations Europe, Lt. General Sir Frederick Morgan. He signed the WWII Peace negotiations at Reims, France for Britain. No date.

Soviet Propaganda poster in a Czechoslovakian Hospital: "Destroy Fascism's Nest Forever." 1946. Note snake in form of a Swastika being cut apart.

UNRRA Director General Fiorello LaGuardia, former mayor of New York City, talks with children of Displaced Persons at Funk Kaserne, UNRRA's Emigration and Repatriation Center in Munich. Boy with flowers is Olav Hetako, a two year old stateless child. August, 1946.

"Polish government officials quickly took over re-orientation of Displaced Persons in the camps in Germany (before repatriation), organizing adults & children into "patriotic" groups—with strong regimentation and political subservience. Notice uniforms provided to various ages. I was not allowed admittance so took this photograph from a balcony. 1946."